December 19, 2008

Here's a Washington Post story that's relevant to the mortgage meltdown. As you know, Wall Street poured hundreds of billions of dollars into ludicrously inflated and implausible mortgages in the four "sand states" of California, Arizona, Nevada, and Florida. In essence, this was a bet that Hispanicization and high home values are compatible. We now know the answer.

But ... was the question even asked? Did anybody at a financial firm send around an email to fellow executives asking, "Isn't California full of Latinos? Can Latinos really pay back these giant mortgages were handing them? If Latinos can't, then who is going to pay even more to move to a neighborhood that we just helped tip Latino? What exactly are we doing in California?"

Of course not. Such an email would come up in "discovery" of an anti-discrimination case, as the federal government itself is finding out:

A federal magistrate judge has ruled that the U.S. Secret Service "made a mockery" of long-standing rules by failing to preserve, concealing and even destroying evidence sought by 10 African American current and former employees in a racial discrimination case.

In an opinion filed late Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Washington, Judge Deborah A. Robinson effectively barred the agency from presenting a defense in the class-action lawsuit filed in 2000.

Robinson called the penalty an appropriate sanction for years of delay because the Secret Service's conduct "prejudiced Plaintiffs' ability to conduct meaningful discovery and prepare to address the merits of their claims."

The judge's ruling effectively lowers the burden of proof for plaintiffs and limits the amount of evidence government lawyers can use to defend the agency against allegations that supervisors routinely harassed black agents and refused to promote them to management positions.

Robinson earlier sanctioned the agency three times for being slow to search for documents as directed by the court and to turn over racially charged e-mails shared by white Secret Service supervisors. Jennifer I. Klar, a lawyer with Relman & Dane, which is representing the plaintiffs pro bono, said the ruling "sends the clear message that no entity, not even the United States government or the elite Secret Service, is above the law."

A spokesman for the Secret Service called the decision "expected" given Robinson's prior rulings. But he said the agency "wholly disagrees" with Robinson's findings and would appeal.

Secret Service spokesman Edwin M. Donovan said the agency has "made every attempt to respond fully and completely to all discovery requests," turning over 22 million documents, asking nearly 300 former employees if they kept relevant records and paying a contractor $2 million to search 350 employee computers and the agency server.

And what's been found in these emails? Such incriminating speech as this example highlighted by ABC News as part of a major story on discrimination in the Secret Service:

Another white senior supervisor, apparently bitter towards the Rev. Al Sharpton and angry at Ruben Studdard for winning "American Idol" in 2003 over Clay Aiken, allegedly wrote, "Reverse discrimination and political correctness are destroying virtually every aspect of American life."

I'm glad ABC put "allegedly" in that sentence, since obviously if he did actually say, "Reverse discrimination and political correctness are destroying virtually every aspect of American life," he should be taken out back and shot immediately. (You didn't know that? You should. It's in the Constitution -- the Zeroth Amendment.) So, we wouldn't want to be hasty in determining whether or not somebody said that.

But the black agent who is the lead plaintiff was discovered to have personally forwarded:

Messages sent from his Secret Service e-mail account include a comparison of black, white and Hispanic wives and how they handle household chores, parenting differences between black and white mothers and a list entitled "No U D'ient," emulating vernacular sometimes associated with low-income African-Americans and including lines that mock those who live in government housing and use food stamps.

23 comments:

headache
said...

The thing to realise about PC is that it’s very much driven by the Chamber of Business types. When I read about the Illegal Immigration battle in the US, it amazes me what power the local Chamber of Commerce bureaus sway. I reckon most of the pressure and money comes from them. La Raza is just a front which the use to intimidate ordinary Americans. Senators are in their pockets. These are the people who mandate PC in order to streamline businesses. They are the ones who loathe Christmas and spit on cultural values and the concept of the nation. Government mostly just adapts to their demands. Of course the churches are off on a tangent and considering the source of financing really have no reason to dance to the tune of these people. The churches are in such a sorry state.

Why is the word discovery in quotes? Discovery is the legal term of art for the process of getting materials from both sides in preparation for trial that relates to the complaint.

I find that missive re Rueben Studdard hilarious. Yeah, he won, but have you heard anything about him? The fact that he won AI had little bearing when it actually came time to sell songs. Aiken cleaned his clock by all accounts, so what's the problem?

Anyway, your whole theory that Latinos were the main or major cause of the sub prime meltdown as aided by the CRA is incorrect. For evidence, see some of Barry Ritholtz's posts on The Big Picture blog.

That being said, it must once again be stated that the fact that they were Latino and could not possibly pay their mortgages was irrelevant for the purposes of the lending companies. They needed a signature and someone that could pay on time for 180 days. That's IT. If they could have found a large pool of 100% red headed alabaster skinned Irish, they would have used them too. It was all about the money.

An absolutely typical racial grievance/scam lawsuit of the sort brought in virtually every larger city every year. The lawyers want to get them in front of a dem appointed judge, black of course if preferable, then engage in "discovery" to see if they can find, among millions of docs, memos, emails, forwarded jokes, party invites, etc. the holy of holies: a somewhat humorous comment on something with a vague, or even explicit, racial joke in mind, that everyone, black and white, chuckles at from time to time. Except in late 20th/early 21st century America this is defined as a grevious wrong, and results in a "settlement" of millions, with 25-35% going to the lead plaintiff's lawyers. Settled because the defense, if not prohibited from defending themselves outright like in the cited case, are afraid that a dumb, "diverse" jury will have paraded in front of them said joke, email etc. as evidence of KKK/Nazi style conduct, and award even more, to "end genocidal racism", as Johnny Cockran once pleaded for in the Simpson case. No one cares because its not usually covered by the press, which would rather write about gay parents, or gay blacksmiths or gay something, and because it's only against a giant government agency or giant company like walmart or a phone company and who cares. And said agency will continue on with life, can't avoid it, until the next "victimized" plaintiff and his lawyer file suit and the scam continues....And only a Tom Wolfe novel will ever do the whole circus full treatment.

Messages sent from his Secret Service e-mail account include a comparison of black, white and Hispanic wives and how they handle household chores, parenting differences between black and white mothers and a list entitled "No U D'ient," emulating vernacular sometimes associated with low-income African-Americans....

"Isn't California full of Latinos? Can Latinos really pay back these giant mortgages were handing them? If Latinos can't, then who is going to pay even more to move to a neighborhood that we just helped tip Latino?

As long as we can bundle them up into CDOs, and sell them them on to some dumb European bankers, who cares if they can't pay off their mortgages?

I also love the ABC headline, 'Pattern of Discrimination'. Yeah we got a few off color emails that people failed to report, because you know that's their most important job, documenting that you are not a racist in case someone sues your agency in a couple of years.

Oh yeah, somebody found a noose, or was it a rope with a loop, but its sinister because they declined to release pictures of it. I am sure the 'epic' eight-year anti-discrimination suit hasn't contributed to the interpretation of the incident.

Re the mortgage mess, so-called "minority loans" did not cause the mortgage meltdown. The 'extreme' lonas, the subprimes so heavily used by minorities, only made up 6-12% to the total as noted by Sailor weeks earlier. So said "minority loans" are really only a small slice of the overall meltdown pie, and indeed, most toxic loans were made OUTSIDE the asupices of the more conservative gubment CRA lending practices.

Was a rising Hispanic population one of the factors in loan acceleration? Sure. But so was overall population growth in places like Florida, which gains hundreds of thousands of new residents every year. People sold their properties for big money up nawth or out west, and moved to Florida or someplace else and bought cheap. They made a killing. Then there is the army of white speculators, real estate agents, brokers and others looking to cash in on property and easy financing. Also in that horde were your regular white soccer moms, looking to trade up to bigger and better property covered by easy financing. Also in the mix were lower income white people who too benefitted in the stampede. So trying to somehow blame "Hispanics" just doesn't hold up.

As for "tipping" a neighborhood Latino, so what? "Tipping" is old news in urban America. One of the reasons white immigrants like Poles, Italians, Jews and Irish got into their early neighborhoods is that they bought enough property from Anglos to "tip" said 'hoods. This is urban history 101. Ironically, in 18th century Boston, there had "black flight" as blacks who had lived there for decades moved out, as the more violent, substance-abused white Irish moved in. So changing neighnorhoods are part and parcel of the American economy. The real problem is not "tipping" but the dismal failure of the US gubment, sometimes at the behest of white businessmen, to enforce or strengthen illegal immigration laws on our borders. That's the real problem, not the natural pattern of changing neighborhoods.

As for the Service Case, I notice Sailor does not fret about why the Secret Service is dragging its feet before a judge in turning over the documents on this internal matter, so much so, that they had to be sanctioned several times by the judge. What it smells like is that the Secret Service has some things to hide and cover up, over and above the usual foot-dragging that accompanies any court case.

Any employee court case, particularly sexual harassment or discrimination cases generates a lot of paper. With a class-action suit the poundage would be multiplied. This ain't nothing new, or surprising. That's labor litigation 101. That a federal judge had to sanction the SS for "failing to preserve, concealing and even destroying evidence" suggests ass-covering and track-covering by the SS. They may have a lot to conceal if it has gone this far.

Sailor correctly notes that some relatively mild things have been found in the SS documents such as white supervisors complaining about reverse discrimination and political correctness, after a black guy won American Idol. Nothing spectacular there. And a black plaintiff was found forwarding some race jokes via email. Noting spectacular there either. Then you have videos making the rounds of white employees depicting the murder of blacks by the KKK.

Will lawyers pore over such details and spin them to maximum effect? Sure. That's what trial lawyers do, and in employee cases, such details are crucial in influencing a jury. Sexual harassment cases for example routinely get into such details, and harassment cases, mostly involving women being harassed by men, are a lot easier to win than discrimination cases. It is not at all surprising that the black plaintiffs are pulling out all the stops, including taking their case to the media. They have a lot more heavy lifting. It's do or die.

Employee cases will always involve such details, but why is the SS going around destroying documents according to the federal judge, if all the black plaintiffs' case rested on was a few stupid email jokes, some of which they themselves passed around? Is it mere "political correctness" or does the SS have some tracks it desperately needs to cover?

I think that the judge who made that ruling has a son who has run afoul of the law on gun and drug charges. If you look online you should be able to find a picture of the judge’s son complete with dreadlocks etc.

"Reverse discrimination and political correctness are destroying virtually every aspect of American life."

This is one of the most precise, concise, and true sentences I have read in a long time. It should be framed and put on the wall or desk of every thinking American.

But, hey, we can't have all that truth coming out infecting all those brainwashed American brains, can we. And Judge Robinson is just the 'lady' to see that the p.c. thing is done. Wonder where her sympathies lie? I just looked up her picture on Google Images. Surprise, surprise - African American.

And DIFFERENCES - how could any right thinking American who has gone through public brainwashing, er, uh, I mean public schooling, even consider that there are differences between the races (gee, I thought there WEREN'T races?)? Handling household chores, parenting, even - horror of horrors - speaking are different from one race to another.This can't possibly be true, can it?

the only horror here is the federal government's continued use of the incorrect and wildly inaccurate definitions of "hispanic" and "latino".

does steve not get what a huge problem this will be in the future, considering that all federal policy and law is about to become racialized, and identity politics will affect every federal issue?

anybody doing real research or background work on race in the united states needs to drop these terms from their vocabulary immediately. there absolutely, positively is no such thing as a "hispanic" or "latino" race. and the current american ideas about how "hispanicness" is transferred to a human are totally dumb, and will lead to plenty of very stupid situations and policies in the coming years.

Reverse Discrimination cases are going to be happening more and more. My guess is that if Eric Holder doesn't get confirmed as the U.S. Attorney Genral then Obama will appoint Mr. Reverse Discrimination himself to the positoin: Deval Patrick. First thing DP did when he took over the Civil Rights division under Clinton was to end all Reverse Discrimination cases. Washington is filled with too many PC people so there is no way in the world 2 black men in a row would be turned down for the job. And since Obama cares about one thing and one thing only (Changing America's democgraphics to be a lot browner) you can bet your bottom dollar he wil have a radical and/or corrupt AG under him.

Of course, the real reason many people can't get ahead without affirmative action or law suits is because they think that when they chose not to work within a system or can't it's because of discrimination. But, the reason the U.S. became a world power is because we are part of a great culture and people who came here learned to work within that culutre. Now people who grow up here and can't fit into a system expect to be catered to rather than change, assimilate, or learn. Many simply can't change, assimilate, or learn and we shouldn't cater to them. The interesting thing about the U.S. though is that we are a great country not because of our Constitution or our Bill of Rights but because of our Western European cultural heritage. Prior to 1965 the population was 88% Western European. Now we are 65% Western European and anyone with two eyes can tell our country and culture is slowly being degraded. The reason why is that it's the culture that makes a country and not some piece of paper - even if it's as well written as the Bill of Rights and the Constistution. Plenty of countries have fancy Constitutions - India, Uganda, South Africa, etc. and they are for the most part third world slums. The reason is the culture and not the fancy Constitution. Therefore, the more people who immigrate here from a non-Western background the less likely we will retain our Western Culture values. A metaphor: If you give a fat person the best health advice in the world they are still likely to remain fat no matter how wonderful the diet is. And if you give someone who is very healthy no diet advice that person will still likely remain healthy because of their internal values and culture. People say the Irish, Germans, and Italians "Assimilated" here so the H-1B Visa Holders (along with their Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, etc. who come along via "Family Reunification") and Illegal Immigrants will also be able too. That's a very false premise since the Irish, Germans, and Italians were already part of Western Civ. Moving from Dublin to New York for and Irish person is really not too different than for an American to move from Chicago to New York. But, to move from some third world village where there are Honor Killings and Arranged Marriages to Central Pennsylvania is a whole different story especially when the people from third world villages begin outnumbering U.S. Citizens. Then you have the crime, food stamps, unpaid hospital bills, etc. all of which is paid by U.S. taxpayers.

We need to end Affirmative Action, Minority Set Asides, and low interest loans to minorities from the government. We also need to repeal the Community Reinvestment Act. We need to end or severely restrict the number of H-1B Visas for both economic and cultural reasons. We should have a Timeout on Immigration into the U.S. until we can assililate everyone who is already here. We shouldn't even consider allowing anymore immigrants (uless they are from European countries) until more than 95% of the U.S. population can read, write, and speak English. We need to end the H-1B Visa Program, End the L1 Visa program, fine and imprison employers and managers who hire illegal immigrants, and repeal the 1965 Hart-Celler Immigration Act. Basically we simply need to go back to pre-1965 National Origins Immigration policies.

headache said ...The thing to realize about PC is that it’s very much driven by the Chamber of Business types. When I read about the Illegal Immigration battle in the US, it amazes me what power the local Chamber of Commerce ... I agree. Shortly before the 2008 election the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, La Raza Centro Legal, and others filed briefs against the Oklahoma and Arizona E-VERIFY programs in an attempt to reduce wages of the American poor and increase Americans average tax burden.

Why any foresighted businessman would even consider joining such an unconscionable organization the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has now become, I have no idea.

SEATTS—Citing fallout from the sub-p mortgage disast, WaMu was forced to file for ChapLev this past Septems. "We tried to negosh our way out of total insolves, but we're in a pretty bad resesh," WaMu spokesperson William "Dubs" McClough said. "This could turn into full-on economic depresh. It's totes ridic." Dubs went on to add that all of the bank's liabilities, including deposits, covered bonds, and other secured debt, would be assumed by JP-Morgan Chase—with the exception of unsecured senior debt, which is prioritized ahead of all other subordinated debts in the event of default— thus protecting depositors and limiting insurance liability to the FDIC.

As for "tipping" a neighborhood Latino, so what? "Tipping" is old news in urban America. One of the reasons white immigrants like Poles, Italians, Jews and Irish got into their early neighborhoods is that they bought enough property from Anglos to "tip" said 'hoods. This is urban history 101.

You think any group is equivalent to whites? "Hell, everybody's basically the same - so what?" When you could choose to have a Jewish surgeon or a mestizo surgeon, is your attitude "so what?" When you could choose to walk through a white area at night or through a black area - is your attitude "so what"? If you could choose to move to Switzerland or to Zimbawbe - is your attitude "so what"?

Even if there were no major differences among different types of people, many people would understandably wish to live among their own type. For the people pushed out by another people, the consequences are not something they say "so what?" over.

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